Activist Boston Jews Arrested for Shutting Down Israeli Consulate

by Stephen Lendman (stephenlendman.org - Home - Stephen Lendman)

Eight IfNotNow Boston chapter Jews deserve high praise, not prosecution for their courageous nonviolent, largely symbolic action.

On April 3, they locked themselves to the Boston-based Israeli Consulate of New England, protesting against the IDF bloodbath in Gaza last Friday - 17 Palestinians gunned down in cold blood, nearly 1,500 others injured, mostly from live fire.

The organization's principles are as follows:

— wanting US Jewish support for illegal Israeli occupation ended;

— supporting traditional Jewish values and cultural diversity;

— opposing establishment institutions supporting what demands condemnation;

— taking the initiative in pursuing the organization's goals; and

— embodying nonviolent discipline as the only responsible way to win Jewish community hearts and minds for agenda.

Members operate pro bono, accepting no funding from any sources seeking to influence their activities.

They take no public position on BDS, Zionism or Palestinian statehood, seeking only to end US Jewish support for lawless, repressive occupation.

They support racial, economic and gender justice, "fight(ing) for the liberation of all people."

"If not now, when," the organization asks? It was founded in 2014 - "a moral call to the American Jewish community to oppose the war."

Activist member Shira Tiffany involved in organizing the consulate shutdown said "Israeli…violence against (Gazan) protesters (was) inevitable" given over half a century of brutalizing occupation - notably in besieged Gaza, its two million residents being suffocated by slow-motion genocide.

IfNotNow is led by US Jewish millennials. It has over 1,700 members in Austin, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Detroit, Los Angeles, Minneapolis-St. Paul, New York City, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, the San Francisco Bay Area, Toronto, and Washington, DC.

Its website stressed "(t)he time has come to end our community's support for the occupation. We will be the generation to do it."

"The occupation is a daily nightmare for those who live under it, and a moral disaster for those who support and administer it."

IfNotNow is working "to transform the American Jewish community's support for occupation into a call for freedom and dignity for all."

Activists involved in shutting down the Israeli consulate are charged with causing disorder, disturbing the peace and trespassing.

Civil disobedience in resisting tyranny is morally and ethically justified - an obligation to challenge injustice.

America, other Western countries and Israel disturbingly honor their worst, punishing their best. 

If not now, when should people of conscience say no more - putting their bodies on the line for long denied justice.

VISIT MY NEW WEB SITE: stephenlendman.org (Home - Stephen Lendman). Contact at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.

My newest book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III."

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html